Sufjan Stevens

Sufjan Stevens' 2010 album, The Age of Adz, came out of nowhere in many ways. For one, it was announced a mere six weeks before its release. And then it sounded like little else we'd ever heard from the troubadour-- delicate finger-picking and narrative storytelling were replaced by geyser-like electronic beats and abstract wails. The ensuing tour-- which had Stevens dancing in shiny "space garbage" while hyper-colorful projections popped behind his costumed band-- took his bold new vision even further.

The new moves were polarizing, with some fans left confused by the drastic changes. But Stevens isn't backing down. "It's a big shift, and it may not be for some people," he told us matter-of-factly when we recently called him up in Hong Kong, where he was visiting his sister during a break from his Age of Adz tour.

The following conversation touches on everything about the artist's latest left turn, including the mysterious illness Stevens fell under while making Adz, how Michael Jackson influenced the album's tour, and what's next for the unpredictable indie star:

Pitchfork: What do you say to someone who really loved your previous work but was thrown for a loop by the The Age of Adz album and tour?

Sufjan Stevens: I can't apologize for the direction I'm going because it feels necessary and obvious. I know it's confusing because I'm something of an aesthetic nightmare, and I kind of suffer from multiple personality disorder. But that's part of me and my character. So, I guess I don't care. It's a big shift, and it may not be for some people. They should stay home. [laughs] Don't listen to the record; don't buy it.

I'm very aware that this material is far less popular and accessible than the kind of songwriting on Illinois. I'm also willing to admit that these songs don't measure up to the songs I was writing five years ago; these aren't great songs in terms of the palpable, fundamental nature of a song. But I'm not interested in songwriting anymore. I'm interested in sound and movement. And this material is all about that. Unfortunately, we sold the tickets to the tour before I even had the record done, so a lot of people didn't really have the chance to know what they were investing in. I apologize for that.

Pitchfork: Even more than the album, the subsequent tour was surprising considering all the dancing and neon costumes and vocal effects. Were you nervous about performing this show for the first time?

SS: I was nervous because I didn't know if all the elements would come together. But I wasn't nervous about people's perception-- I didn't have time or energy for that. The tour was a lot to manage for me with the size of the band and all of the new visual elements onstage. The whole thing was one big stress ball for me. [laughs] It was the hardest set I've ever done. It was fun, too.

Watch Sufjan and his band perform the Age of Adz track "Too Much" on "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon":

Pitchfork: It seems like nothing you do is ever simple-- do you feel like you put yourself in these stressful situations on purpose?

SS: [laughs] Yeah, life is all about toiling and labor. But obviously I get great joy in confronting challenge and taking risk. I don't ever want to be comfortable. I think a big element in what I do is public innovation. Even a very simple thing like dancing-- which to anyone else would be normal and natural-- is very alien and weird for me. So I used that as a personal challenge: How can I really embody this music physically and do it in a way that's challenging my own comfort level? In effect, I'm also challenging the viewer because maybe they're not used to me dancing or singing through vocal effects.

Pitchfork: When I caught the show in New York, you played most of the new album and then came back out for an encore of older material. To me, the encore felt anticlimactic; it didn't seem to fit.

SS: I do feel like it's obvious that Michigan and Illinois don't really work with this stuff, and that's why the set is almost all from the new record. It's important to keep it separate. During the encore, I'm just throwing a bone to those few people who were probably really frustrated with the show.

I don't want to condescend to my former self and to my material-- that's irresponsible. You have to take account for everything you write and stand by it. But I agree with you. The older songs don't sit well with this stuff, and it feels like there's something very naïve about them. I still think it's important that they have a life beyond me and my own ability to embody them. The songs are not my own. I'm a populist in that sense, where I don't want to be too protective of it. I don't want to take away a person's experience at a show. They own that experience, and that's theirs to have.

Pitchfork: How much thought did you put into the show's dancing?

SS: The dancing was a major and necessary element. Most of what I was doing was improvised, but the girls' dancing was all worked out, and it was a big part of the conceptual vision of the show. For me, movement was the salvation in the whole thing. The music didn't really matter. I was less invested in language and in wordplay and creating themes and characters-- I purposefully wanted to dumb that down because it was more about the body and physically participating in the songs. Even though it's not like a huge laser-light production, there was so much work involved.

Pitchfork: Do you ever go to any big shows at places like Madison Square Garden?

SS: Almost never. I wanted to see Lady Gaga or Justin Bieber because I wanted to see what the high-production thing really looks and feels like. But I think the biggest show I went to last year was Arcade Fire at Madison Square Garden, and there wasn't really that much production to it. They have enough energy onstage that they don't really need all that. But my resolution this year is to really seek out these big production shows and try to get tickets.

Pitchfork: Why are you interested in seeing those sorts of shows?

SS: There's an element of that in what I'm doing, and I just want to see how it's done the right way. I don't think we're doing anything the right way, really. We're going through the motions, and the gestures are there. Like, the girls who are singing with me are singers, not dancers. They can dance, but it's not like a Michael Jackson-backup-dancers kind of thing. We were looking at old Paula Abdul and Janet Jackson YouTubes when we were working through the choreography, so I want to know what people are doing now.

I watched the Michael Jackson documentary This Is It and was really surprised at how inspired I was by it-- just the work that goes into that kind of production and how invested the dancers were and also how hands-on Michael Jackson was. He was there directing everything. He had real vision for the show, and all the decisions he was making were based on the body and movement. I realized for the first time that all of his music is based on physical ideas. They'd be working through something, and he would explain a musical gesture with his body. That was really educational.

Pitchfork: Your moves made me think of David Byrne and the Talking Heads concert film Stop Making Sense.

SS: David Byrne is the foundation on which a lot of us are building our careers because Talking Heads were all about content but without explanation or justification. There's obviously meaning in a lot of Talking Heads songs, but he wasn't holding himself accountable, and he let the music, beats, body, and dance explain the songs for him. I think a lot of music-- including my show-- is based on that now.

Pitchfork: What were some other aesthetic inspirations for the show?

SS: I was really into TRON-- those outfits and colors and the lasers. And prog-rock stuff like Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Yes, and Rick Wakeman-- all that corny stuff from the 70s. I was listening to some of that, too. And maybe Parliament-- not that what I'm doing is like Parliament-- but just the outfits and the idea of funky space jams. Everything seems kind of drug-induced but it's not. We're very sober when we're onstage, for better or for worse. [laughs]

Pitchfork: I read about how you were dealing with a mysterious ailment while making this album. Does that have any connection with your current focus on the body and movement?

SS: Yeah, possibly. Because when you're sick-- whether it's a serious illness or a flu-- you're an invalid and there's a real physical debilitation. After going through that and finding wellness in the end, I really wanted to celebrate movement and touch and physicality. I never really mediated on my body so much before, and it was really important to me.

Pitchfork: Do you know exactly what was wrong with you?

SS: I don't. It was like the flu or a virus or an allergic reaction where I had all these weird symptoms. And I was extremely tired for a long time, like I had mono. No energy, no appetite. I also had these weird nervous-system things: pins and needles, numbing, pains shooting up and down my legs. It was these weird, outer space sensations that I had never felt before.

And even though I saw all these doctors and did all this holistic stuff, I never got to the bottom of it. It went on in waves for months and months and then finally dissipated. While reading about other weird nervous-system illnesses, I realized there's so much we don't even know about. It's such a black hole in terms of science and knowledge.

Pitchfork: Do you think having your mortality put in front of you like that contributed to this album's sense of urgency?

SS: For sure. It was traumatic, and that induces an anxiety and desperation in one's life and work. There's a sense of urgency in understanding that your body is not really your own. We can control it to a certain extent through habits and good behavior, but there's so much we don't have control of. A virus is an invasive thing, a microscopic attacker. You just have to live through it.

Pitchfork: One of the main inspirations behind The Age of Adz was schizophrenic outsider artist Royal Robertson. He seemed to have a lot of anger and misogyny in his work-- how did you relate to his manic perspective?

SS: His work has a lot of issues, but I was attracted more to his aesthetic and lack of boundaries. I know people who knew him personally and they said that-- in spite of the real anger in his art-- he was a real gentleman and that he had utmost respect for women. So there was this discrepancy in his work and his character. We all contain multitudes and have the potential for extreme kindness and vengeance at the same time. That's a crude generalization, but if you read the newspaper you have a sense of what we're capable of as human beings.

And he embodied that as a person in his art. I find a lot of folk art to be quaint and cute and naïve, but Royal's work is very violent, and there are parts of it that are very pornographic, too. There's an adult nature to it, and at the same time, it's also really childlike. It's really disturbing, and I felt like I needed to meditate on that.

Pitchfork: Did you connect with Robertson's obsessive nature with regard to his art?

SS: Once his wife and family left him, he didn't really have a life outside of his art. His work was like a community that he created. I suppose that's what art is: this fantasy world that we create and live in. Some of my music requires an obsessive-compulsive approach and a real embodiment of excessiveness. So I really have to live in that world of overstimulation. Sometimes I think it's like a drug; more is more, and you can never get enough. The older I get, the more I crave that excessive aesthetic. It's never going to satisfy me.

Pitchfork: Do you look at Royal as a cautionary tale?

SS: Not so much. Well, maybe. I want to shy away from a morality discussion with Royal, because I don't know enough about him to know what was going on in his mind. Really, he was sick. He had schizophrenia, and that was the outcome. But his work and his illness were so conjoined. They necessitated each other in some ways. It's unfortunate that he died a lonely man in poverty. But I don't know if there was any other option for him.

If there's any kind of morality, for me, it's about reality; what is reality? I have a hard time distinguishing what is valuable when it comes to the real world and the fantasy world. Like, should I invest my time in the ordinary world or the imaginary world? Royal made a decision and completely escaped the ordinary world. Maybe that's enlightenment. Maybe that's what it's like to be in heaven. I don't know.

For me, the sensory pleasure of sound and music is so transcendent that I begin to distrust it and worry if it's a distraction from ordinary life. Maybe I should be spending my time doing something else, like start a family. Or build an amusement park-- actually, that's still a fantasy world. Engineering? Investment banking? Real estate? There are all kinds of people who make the world go 'round. [laughs]

SS: Yeah, I'm always playing with the idea. Because I had other plans, you know? I wanted to be a graphic designer, a teacher, a writer. We all have our plans, but they're worth nothing. There's a sequence of events that takes over. But I'm not quitting now. I'm fully embracing the life of the musician.

Pitchfork: Do you think we'll have to wait as long for another album from you next time?

SS: No, I'm not going to do that anymore. I want to start releasing a lot more and do it without the orthodoxy of a proper release. I want to do more download EPs like All Delighted People, too. I'm always writing and recording anyway, so I think it's healthier to make things available even if they don't have a complete, conceptual form.

Pitchfork: Do you have a bunch of finished songs on some hard drive somewhere?

SS: [laughs] Yeah, I have a lot of really weird stuff. I don't know if anyone wants to hear it.

Pitchfork: Weirder than The Age of Adz?

SS: Oh yeah. I did some stuff with my stepdad, Lowell-- Music for Insomnia-- a couple years ago, and it was like improvised noise. That's really where my heart is, unfortunately. I'm less interested in songwriting and more into just making noise.